Harvard professor criticizes government’s Anglo Irish payment

Harvard professor and political adviser Jeffrey Sachs advised that the government’s handing over of $1bn (€725m) to Anglo Irish bondholders was “not a good decision.” Sachs delivered his comments at the second annual Kilkenomics, a combination of economic and comedic punditry.

Thomas Molloy of The Independent reports that Sachs, the youngest economics professor to ever be tenured at Harvard, went on to say that a decision to stop payments to Anglo Irish bondholders who purchased risky bonds was “not like breaching a contract.”

What does Sachs see for the future of Ireland? "With Ireland you need more proposals on the table and I wouldn't expect the Government to come up with them," said Sachs at the festival. Molloy writes that Sachs predicted that solutions for the worldwide economic crisis will come from activists and entrepreneurial politicians, rather than the public sector.

Sachs was joined by other top economists and top comedians at the four day festival in Kilkenny. Hailed as the “most thought-provoking,” Indian banker and analyst Vikas Nath proclaimed that the debt in Greece, a nation making up a miniscule 2.5% of the Eurozone, is “irrelevant” to people in larger nations such as India or China.

He also warned that Ireland should not delay any more. "Don't let it stretch out for years. Don't let it be a death by a thousand cuts."